Film critic Roger Ebert dies at 70

Roger Ebert, the Pulitzer
Prize-winning film critic whose famous thumbs-up or thumbs-down verdict helped
make him the most famous reviewer in America, died Thursday of complications
from cancer, according to the Chicago Sun-Times, where he wrote for 46
years. He was 70.

Ebert had been battling
thyroid cancer since 2002, but never gave up his aisle-seat post or his love of
cinema, publishing more than 300 reviews last year alone despite his inability
to speak without the help of a voice machine due to an operation that removed
his lower jaw. On Wednesday, he announced that his cancer had returned and that
he would be taking “a leave of presence”. Readers hoped that it was merely
another temporary set-back and that Ebert would return to share his
trusted opinions. Sadly, it was not to be.

Ebert became the film
critic for the Chicago Sun-Times in 1967, where he quickly
demonstrated his deep knowledge of film history and his appreciation for a new
generation of movie stars that were redefining and reinvigorating Hollywood. At
that time, movie critics tended to fall into two categories: slightly
mothball-scented old timers like Bosley Crowther at The New
York Times or hip, intellectual bomb throwers like Pauline Kael. Ebert quickly staked his claim in
that fertile middle ground — he was smart but not pretentious. A populist who
called ‘em like he saw ‘em.

Ebert achieved an unlikely
national fame when, in 1975, he and Chicago Tribune critic Gene Siskel launched the PBS
show Sneak Previews.
That same year, he was also recognized with a Pulitzer Prize for his work at
the Sun-Times (clearly, the Pulitzer committee didn’t hold his
screenwriting collaboration with softcore auteur Russ Meyer on 1970′s Beyond the Valley of the
Dolls against him). Still, it was his on-air exposure that
vaulted him to becoming the most famous movie critic in America. »

Your message has been successfully submitted and would be delivered to recipients shortly.